Recovery

Recovery is a journey, and it’s a journey that requires support--from friends, mentors, therapists, and family. These books can’t take the place of the real human beings needed in the process, but they can be valuable elements of your support network just the same, providing much inspiration, insight, and knowledge.

In this beautifully written memoir, a daughter travels to her mother's Tibetan homeland and finds both her own deep connections to her heritage and a people trying to maintain its cultural integrity despite Chinese occupation.After her mother dies in a car accident in India, Tsering Wangmo Dhompa decides to take a handful of her ashes back to her homeland in Tibet. Her mother left Tibet in her youth as a… Read More

Yoga philosophy and practice are increasingly being used therapeutically to help people overcome disordered eating patterns—like overeating, food addiction, and stress eating—and the resulting emotional distress they can cause. Sarahjoy Marsh offers a program using yoga to address food-centered behaviors and body image issues. She illuminates the nature of addiction and offers a methodical approach to recovery that is neither dogmatic nor rigid; rather, it is compassionate, hopeful, and deliberate.Full… Read More

Mindfulness, the quality of attention that combines full awareness with acceptance of each moment, just as it is, is gaining broad acceptance among mental health professionals as an adjunct to treatment. Because at the heart of addiction is the fear of painful emotional states, addicts compulsively seek drugs and alcohol to avoid or escape emotional pain. Mindfulness, on the other hand, helps us develop greater acceptance and ease with life’s… Read More

Full recovery from an eating disorder is possible. Despite what you may have been led to believe, most people with anorexia, bulimia, or binge eating disorder are able to completely restore their health and well-being. But how does this happen? Author Aimee Liu has woven together dozens of first-person accounts of recovery to create a break-through roadmap for healing from an eating disorder. Restoring Our Bodies, Reclaiming Our Lives… Read More

The key to ongoing freedom from alcoholism or any other kind of addiction is right before us, here and now, in the ordinary and perfect present moment. The problem is that addictions are often the result of our efforts to escape living in the present in the first place. Bill Alexander’s unique approach uses mindfulness (a nonjudgmental awareness of our moment-to-moment experience), story, and meditation to help alcoholics and others… Read More

All of us are caught up in addictions—big or small. Enough! presents a practical path that releases us from the grip of negative habits and addictions that block a full and meaningful life. We can learn how to undo our habits and addictions, but to do this we have to first find their triggers. With the right techniques, we can disarm them and learn more effective ways for dealing… Read More

The art of mindfulness can transform our struggles with food—and renew our sense of pleasure, appreciation, and satisfaction with eating. Drawing on recent research and integrating her experiences as a physician and meditation teacher, Dr. Jan Bays offers a wonderfully clear presentation of what mindfulness is and how it can help with food issues.Mindful eating is an approach that involves bringing one's full attention to the process of eating—to all… Read More

Are you a shopaholic? Do you use shopping as a quick fix for the blues? Do you often buy things that you don’t need or can’t afford? Do your buying binges leave you feeling anxious or guilty? Is your shopping behavior hurting your relationships? Have you tried to stop but… Read More

For writers, artists, musicians, and creators in every field, this book offers a complete addiction recovery program specifically designed for the creative person. Full of explanations and exercises, this book presents ways to use your own innate creative abilities in service of your recovery and at each stage of the recovery process. Topics include: the biological and developmental risks unique to creative people; the special personality traits that can… Read More

In this raw and moving memoir, Claude Thomas describes his service in Vietnam, his subsequent emotional collapse, and his remarkable journey toward healing. At Hell's Gate is not only a gripping coming-of-age story but a spiritual travelogue from the horrors of combat to the discovery of inner peace—a journey that inspired Thomas to become a Zen monk and peace activist who travels to war-scarred regions around the world.… Read More